Social Media

Are You a Comments Troll?

For the most part, Mashable's commenters are tech-savvy and full of wit, but we're well aware of the lure some Internet lurkers feel when to comes to entering the realm of trolldom. When a story's subject/author/factual errors/typeface sends one into a fit of rage, it can be hard to hold back one's ire.

Last week, The Boston Globe's Neil Swidey wrote a rather intriguing story on the subject, even tracking down and profiling a few real-life trolls (it's lengthy, but worth a read). And, inspired in part by said story — as well as the comments sections of many a favorite website — my Stuff Hipsters Hate co-writer Andrea Bartz and I chose to delve into this subject in our most recent Netiquette column for CNN.

Check out the top of the piece here, and then head over to CNN to see the rest!

So you're surfing along on your favorite website when you see something that gets your plasma boiling — so much so that that pulsating vein above your eye is about to burst.

The cause of this Web-induced stress could be an opinion that just doesn't jibe with yours. It could be that author's pompous head shot. Either way, your twitching fingers scroll to the bottom of the page — past whatever useless garbage you have just consumed. You're going to the comments section — that oh-so democratic zone of the internet.

But be careful, impassioned Interneteur — at this very moment you have the potential to transform from a perfectly pleasant person into that most loathed and feared Web dweller: the troll.While you should feel entitled to join the discussion, and while we've all "trolled out" at one point or another (the anonymity of the 'net certainly lends itself to oozing venom, like a snake doing battle with a mongoose), it's best to pause before pressing "post."

Ask yourself: Are you contributing to the online dialogue or just grunting unintelligibly?

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